Quick Links

Search

News

CA defends handling of injury to pacers

James Pattinson joined the list of injured Australian pacers after hurting his foot during the second Test against India in Sydney. (Getty Images)

Sydney: As James Pattinson joined the list of injured Australian pacers after hurting his foot during the second Test against India, the country's Cricket Board was on the defensive about its management of the ever-vulnerable tribe of fast bowlers.

Pattinson joined Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood on the sidelines with stress-related foot injuries while Mitchell Johnson (foot), Doug Bollinger (hamstring) and Shane Watson (calf) are also out nursing their injuries.

Australia's physiotherapist Alex Kountouris said injuries are part and parcel of the game and not much should be read into the recent breakdowns. "They've all had a completely different last six months," Kountouris told The Australian.

"Hazlewood was injured all last year but had a really good build up and played a lot of state cricket. Cummins has hardly played any cricket because he got injured at the end of last season and we built him up.

"Pattinson has been flying the whole year, he's been in all our squads, has played shield cricket, and has played four Tests in five weeks. You can't say they each had the same case, did they bowl enough, did they bowl too much?" he added.

Cricket Australia is analysing the injury situation of the pacers but Kountouris said there are no immediate answers. "We're going back and looking at every injury, looking at workloads, how they felt, what they reported, and just seeing if we could have intervened to make a difference.

"Sometimes you can look at one or two small things and say okay, maybe we could have done this better or done that better. There's no real answer," he said.